The pantsuits have become Hillary Clinton’s sartorial signature: She even mentions them on her Twitter bio. They are effective armor for a candidate who has historically faced criticism from a sexist, looks-based media for her fashion choices and hair. They adroitly deflect all of Donald Trump’s sexism, personal insults, bigotry—and, best of all—are magic. They assume their shape, day in, day out. They self-clean. They do not need to be pressed. They do not biodegrade. They will outlive humankind.
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The simple explanation is that red is the color of Republicans. But Donald Trump’s red tie is also the color of the livid, flowing blood of all his opponents, indeed of anyone who would get in his way, or whoever had the temerity to question him. His tie is a warning, and a siren. His tie is red and angry, and so is he.
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Of late, Clinton has been wearing white. This is not because she thinks she is an angel. Online this has spawned a hashtag, #wearwhitetovote, sourced in the color the Suffragettes used to wear. White is this election’s feminist color. Indeed, the first fear the Clinton-loving feminist must conquer is not the sexist claptrap of Trump and Co. but the fear of tomato ketchup.
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These suits were so big and ill-fitting that Bernie Sanders looked like a Muppet character: Fozzie Bear’s raving anti-capitalist uncle, perhaps. Their super-sized boxiness was, of course, ingenious—it made his anti-establishment, anti-slickness shtick that much more authentic.
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We still have a soft spot for these. Fuck-off big, and worn in her old Twitter bio with Clinton looking diva-ishly down at her cellphone. Obviously not the “no-secret-in-my-emails, no siree” look she wants to project. But fabulous.
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Trump sometimes wore a blue tie too—most notably at his first one-on-one debate with Clinton. It was exciting, like he was going to make a break for the Democrat border (no wall). Perhaps wearing the blue tie he would love Mexicans, get the pom-poms out for Planned Parenthood, and repudiate the bigotry of the Family Research Council. But no. The blue tie turned out to be as angry as the red tie.
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OK, the long, flyaway, “I’m too busy for this shit” style she wore as secretary of state was jettisoned for a halo-bob at the beginning of the campaign. Since then, we have seen it worn cresting and big and cresting and contained. We prefer big. But we understand the need for contained. We hope it’s big at home.
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The Trump hair has been calmed, but only in such a way as to make this eighth wonder of the world more mysterious. It’s been cut. The weird skidmark sides have been evened out. The top no longer looks like a squirrel on a suicide mission. But it has only been visually tamed. Rather like its proprietor, any fundamental attempt to change it is destined to fail. Its enemy is not Hillary Clinton, its enemy is wind, or even a light breeze—then, all follicular hell breaks loose.
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Whether Mrs. Trump was letting her clothes do the talking the day she wore this, and if so what those words were saying, remains unclear. Some critics read a lot into her choice of a fuchsia pussybow blouse at the presidential debate following the release of her husband’s “grab them by the pussy” remarks. If the clothing was a medium for a message, was it feminist and condemnatory, or a pro-Trump in-joke? Debate if you have energy left to do so. Anyway, it was by Gucci and it was $1,100. So it was an expensive message if it was one.
Multi-purpose headwear. They’re a handy advertising board for his catchphrase. They’re an immediate fashion shoutout to every middle-aged Republican man and woman on a golf course anywhere, seeking refuge from the modern world, suspicious of black and gay people unless they’re serving them drinks. The caps calm that crazy, antagonistic hair. And they seek to make Trump—who lives like any Manhattan plutocrat high on Louis XIV love juice, in an extremely camp apartment decked out in ridiculous amounts of gold—just a regular guy.
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For much of the campaign, Ivanka Trump appeared the most reasonable Trump: beautiful, telegenic, and mellifluous and sane-sounding. But as her father’s misogynistic transgressions mounted, and Ivanka’s silence magnified, a campaign to boycott her own-name products began, and remains ongoing.
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As brilliantly spoofed by Saturday Night Live as arising out of nowhere like besuited, dead-eyed Children of the Corn, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump were notable for their slick-backed hair and sneering expressions.
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Hot as a young housing lawyer and still cuddly-handsome today, Clinton’s running mate lapped up the race with that crazy-wide smile. Tim Kaine, arise, you are “American dad.”
Chelsea Clinton, used to being mercilessly mocked as first daughter with her corkscrew curls and braces, has played the most sensible style game of the whole campaign season. Stayed plain, supported her mom, done her own thing. She did glam up, however, in a $2,000 red Roland Mouret dress at the 2016 Democratic National Convention to warmly, and touchingly, introduce her mother.
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